TECH: Motivation...

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

Original posting: Wed, 7 Sep 1994 18:35:01 JST

hi, debra

I've been mostly lurking for a couple of weeks now and can't help noticing how prolific many of you are. I'm interested in ways that others stay motivated to keep on writing. I find that without the pressure of a deadline -- whether from a workshop, a class, or a writer's group -- that I tend to slack off completely. In other words, I need external motivation. Is this true for any others out there -- or is it only me? -- and what tips can you offer on getting motivated from within?

quick scattered thoughts...

Number one, if you want a deadline, we'll give you one. Let's see. How about Sept. 15? All right, get to work!

As for motivation... I'm not sure I know the best way, but here are a few tricks.

As others have suggested, make it a habit. Same time, plan to do about the same amount of work (start small, then up it as you get used to it, and don't let a temporary layoff stop you--get back into the habit as soon as possible).

Set yourself a "process" goal--X words, scenes, whatever you feel comfortable with--and work against that. I find promising myself so much each day or week to be fairly effective.

However, if you like external deadlines or goals--why not tell us when and what you are going to provide to the group? I promise we'll heckle you when the deadline is coming... (whee! this could be fun!)

Some people seem to prefer having finite deadlines--make their outlines, then assign deadlines for each part, and work against those. I do better with so much each day, and let the pieces fall where they may, but do whichever one makes sense to you.

When I start a project, there's a lengthy period where I feel a little as if I had just started blowing up a balloon. Whoosh, whoosh as hard as I want, and nothing happens! Very frustrating, but experience shows two things. First, I can stop blowing for a moment to stretch and pull at the balloon, loosening it up. This often makes it much easier to blow up. Second, if I keep going, there's a sudden relaxation of whatever was holding it and there she goes... In the same way, starting a writing project can feel the same. Notes, bits and pieces, lots of blank pages (or screens), and the feeling of getting nowhere. But keep pushing, or do a few loosening up exercises, and then look at the balloon swelling up...

Somewhere after the first notes and before it all gets tidied up, there's often a point where I am so frustrated and angry at the piece that I am ready to throw it away and go take up bricklaying or something I can understand. Couple of different options here. One is to lay it aside and relax for a little bit, then come back to it. Read some of the junk that has been printed (I keep a couple real trash novels around as inspiration--if this kind of trash can be printed, I'm not so bad!). Usually NOT a good idea to really work on something else, although you can do some "light writing" or other setup work. Two is to keep on going, work on some of the unwritten parts, etc. Try to avoid going back and rewriting everything at this point, because you don't want to trash the thing until you're feeling better and can look at it semi-objectively.

Finally, I often "finish" it...and don't really like it. I'm quite hard on myself, and the "finished" pieces usually don't feel really done to me. This is one that the list can (and does) help with--toss it out here, and see how other people react. You may be pleasantly surprised to find that they like the piece, even if you aren't so sure about it.

This last one is a pain. I've halfway learned to go ahead and post things here, even if I don't think it is too good. I've even learned to go ahead and start rolling it through the markets, even if I'm not sure about it. This doesn't mean that I don't polish it as well as I can, and take the opportunity to revise it again sometimes when it comes back, but I've given up on holding onto each piece until I am absolutely sure it is the Great American short story, novel, poem, etc. I'll settle for a reasonable facsimile of a short, dumpy, middle-aged white male short story, novel, poem, etc.

I guess what I see is that like the process of motivating a group to work on a project (which I have a great deal of experience with), part of the key is that you need multiple motivations. There has to be an overall dream or vision, along with the goals and hopes and fears of what it would be like to finish the project. But you also break it into little steps, with weekly checkups and reviews, daily inchpebbles, and pat yourself on the back as you get to each waymarker. Take a moment to look around and realize that that last step has put you at the top of a foothill (perhaps) and to look at where you are now, where you started, and where you are going (again). Then (deep breath) forward ho! one more step in the unending march...

BTW, when we're doing a project, part of the deal is getting everyone to "buy into" the schedule, deadlines, etc. and then making that public. All the fun of tracking our progress and reminding people of what's coming and what they've missed, along with working out how to revise as the situation changes--it's all part of motivating the project.

Hey, if promising yourself a candybar at the end of each chapter works--do it! Whatever. Just...

Keep on writing!

TECH: More Motivation...

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

Original posting: Thu, 8 Sep 1994 18:35:02 JST

(more meanders from amongst the discards...)

Ha! Suppose, for the sake of argument, that you are writing about a character who is a writer. Now, consider just exactly why this person wants to write. Is it the glory, the fame? How about the incredible golden fleece they expect to tuck into their bank account? Or is it because they promised their poor, deceased greatgrandforebear that they would make the world know the wonders of the family history--but since there aren't too many of those, they are making them up?

What kind of goals does your character have? And what does their indefatigable, indefensible, and likely indecorous insistence on following their plots and pens into the future, no matter how many bales of rejection letters, no matter how low the bank balance, not even listening to those who say "give it up. get real! get a life!" and other scathing remarks... what does all that have to say to those of us who pursue the road less plotted in real life?

Go ahead--write it up, and let yourself tell yourself all about it...

Push or pull? Lots of tech stuff haggles endlessly about whether technology push--do it because you can!--or customer pull(demand)--do it because someone wants it!--is the appropriate reason for doing our little projects. Frankly, I think it depends--sometimes you do things the way the customer wants them (after all, who's paying for it?) and sometimes you do it fresh and new the way you can, then hope you can convince some customers that it really is worthwhile.

(let's look in the dictionary?)...motivate 1. to give a motive or incentive to, to be the motive of...2. to stimulate the interest of, to inspire. motive n. that which induces a person to act in a certain way adj. producing movement or action... and (my favorite!) motley 1. diversified in color 2. of varied character...

interest, inspiration...producing movement or action...of varied character...

Offhand, I think we are. Interesting, inspirational (as long as we don't get too desperate), producing quite a bit of movement or action (perhaps without a great deal of coherence, but who needs a laser, anyway?) and as for motley, we are that.

So, we have met the enemy, and they is us.

We salute you, POGO!

(hehehehehe...bill will yell about comic debacles now, and then I can play the debacles' advocate...ain't we got fun?)

incidently, does anyone have any idea why I would have collected our Giant Food Store receipts from 1980? and still be hauling them around? Amazing... this is packrattitis extremis...

TECH: Blocked!

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

Original Posting: (unknown, but before 1994)

Some scattered thoughts on the dreaded Writer's Block

1. No one ever suggests that a pregnant woman is doing something wrong, but she sure spends a while gestating that rascal before producing something for the world to see. Don't get frantic when it pauses, sometimes the unconscious is gestating...

2. Time to work on some of the boring stuff that makes up the business of writing - setting up files, reading market lists, getting sample copies, etc.

3. What a wonderful chance to review (or read for the first time) some of those books and other resources that are "on hold!" Naturally, you'll want to summarize them, perhaps even posting some of the "nuggets of gold" (whether fool's or real is somebody else's problem) to friends on writers.

4. Good time to lay in some "firewood" for future blazes - sketches, plot outlines, topic lists, etc.

5. Play some games - round robin, jokes, etc. Sit down with a dictionary and stretch those words - try out some new ones for fun.

6. Do some "little" pieces - an intro FAQ, for example (hint!), maybe some non-fiction (how DO you put on eye makeup, anyway?), etc. Heck, watch the boob tube and write your crazy friend in Japan to tell him about some of the stuff happening there - what is ST:TNG or Deep Space Nine? What's a Capio commercial?

7. Personalize that block - it's yours, right? Well, what kind of monster is it? Is it more than one? Is there a comma-lion, gleefully adding commas where they aren't needed with one slashing paw and wiping away needed commas with the other? Or a grey word muck, sucking your words into the dank boredom? Or maybe it's a wild hedge of thorny options, blocking your path with too many choices to make? How about the shining statues of great writers, sitting on their white pillars so far above you that you don't dare smudge their pristine bases with your little mudpies?

Personalize it, then (at least on paper) wage war with it! What is the worst possible result of being rejected by the blob known as the "nasty editor?" Suppose the windmills of the great writers do blow your writing away? And so forth, and so on...

8. Change media - artists often do this, and I think it will help writers, too. If you use a computer, switch to pen and paper for a while, or vice versa. Try pencil and paper, too (my personal preference for thinking times - somehow, crossing out, copying over again, and so forth "feel different" from the simplicity of the computer.)

You also may want to shift subjects - if you write fiction, try poetry (we should have a class going soon, I hope) or non-fiction. If you write fantasy, try doing a hard-boiled private eye. Do some description, some dialogue. Shift from first person to third, or vice versa.

9. Take in some new sights, watch some of those funny art movies, take a walk through the local art museum (you should do that anyway sometimes), talk to the news stand operator about the "regulars" that drop by there, wander through a toy store, take a walk through the aisles of the library that you don't ordinarily visit. Don't worry about writing all this down, you are "laying in firewood" that will pop up later to feed the raging blazes...

10. One that I use sometimes (Step 1. I am a procrastinator) - suppose a truck (or pick your accident) made sure that what you are doing NOW was the last thing you did. Take a moment and think about what you would like that to be - then write that letter to your father, or give your friends on writers a piece of your mind, or whatever, but do it!

11. If you haven't read it, read One Minute For Myself (part of the series that started with The One-Minute Manager).

12. Look around. Sometimes (dreadful as it may seem to say) there are other things in life besides your writing, and your unconscious may be trying to tell you that if you don't talk to your significant other, the rope around their throat will cause some damage. Take a walk, smell some flowers, bang that basketball through the hoop, see what the world looks like from the top of the rocks, learn that rolling naked in nettles is a really bad idea.

Sometimes I think it is not so much that I am blocked as that I am pushing too hard, expecting the muse (unconscious, my pet tink[erbelle], whatever you call it) to come when I say, and that makes the fluttery dear nervous and shy. Sit back, watch the clouds for a moment, and .. don't jump when the winged fairy lands on your knee, just gently enjoy their company...

Block? This may be the busiest time of your life, if you listen to me...